Performance assessment of Primary Health Care: balance and perspective for the ‘Previne Brasil’ Program

Abstract

This article describes and analyzes the response of municipal governments to the payment-for-performance guideline in Primary Health Care (PHC) in the ‘Previne Brasil’ (PB) program in the 2020-2022 period. By establishing the PB in 2019, the Ministry of Health (MS) broke with the PHC financing model, which was based on linear per capita transfer to municipalities and the Federal District. Under the new policy, financial transfers from the MS would result from the analysis of the results of seven performance indicators of health teams reported in the National Register of Health Establishments. The article evaluates the response of subnational governments to the indicators defined by the PB, using data from the Health Information System for Primary Care of the Ministry of Health. The municipalities showed low effectiveness in relation to the performance commitments proposed by the tripartite agreement of the PB in the three-year period investigated. In general, the coverage results agreed in PB are exceptionally low and especially indicative of the risk of an epidemic due to failure in vaccination actions. Decisions to implement payment for performance were repeatedly postponed by the MS, favoring the demobilization of municipal governments in the development of PHC actions.